Committed to Safety and Reliability

Some member services between the Warm Springs and Hot Springs substations were recently exposed to three overvoltage events in the past year. Both instances occurred when a tree outside of the BARC Electric-maintained right-of-way toppled onto the 46-kV transmission line, also affecting the 12.5-kV distribution line used to deliver power to members in the area.

The first event was caused by a dead Ash tree from well outside the right-of-way that fell due to high winds. The second event involved a live oak tree outside the right-of-way that fell during heavy rain.

When the 46-kV line made contact with the 12.5-kV line, a higher-than-normal voltage briefly occurred on the distribution system, long enough to likely cause electronic equipment and circuit boards to fail. BARC’s overvoltage-protection devices are designed for short overvoltage events, such as lighting strikes or switching surges that last less than one hundred milliseconds (0.1 seconds).

What occurs on these devices is that when the system voltage exceeds a pre-determined value, the protective equipment closes a path to ground in the attempt to divert the energy to ground and lower the system voltage to near zero. During an event like this, the fault current exceeds the current equipment’s capabilities. That causes the BARC equipment to fail in the open position, as designed, so a fault to ground does not persist; this is why you may see a blink during a lightning storm instead of an outage This equipment is designed for short-term events.

The BARC Engineering and Operations team consulted with other utilities and consultant firms to identify a solution designed to mitigate the high-voltage event utilizing equipment normally found in an electric substation. Unfortunately, this type of equipment is not readily available off-the-shelf, and there will be a significant delay before these components are received and installed by BARC.

In the meantime, BARC has identified a temporary solution to prevent contact between the energized transmission and distribution lines.

Helicopter Trimming Notice – May 20, 2025

This week, BARC and Penn Lines contracted helicopter trimming along the Johnson’s Creek sub and Indian draft/West Morris Hills right-of-way areas.

This trimming helps with huge and dangerous overhangs and will help eliminate 10 years’ worth of side trimming.

Members should have received calls on right-of-way trimming in the past few weeks. Trimming will continue the remainder of this week. Outages may be expected. BARC personnel are on standby to restore issues as they occur. Thank you for your patience.

Outage Update – May 13, 2025

Update: The 220N outage is from a broken crossarm and a couple stripped poles. Crews are actively working the outage to restore quickly and safely. Terrian is heavily saturated and access has been the main issue on restoration.

As of 5:47 a.m., a majority of members should be back on after a transmission outage. Crews are actively patrolling 220N at this time to work on restoration for the remaining members.

Outage map: https://barcelectric.ebill.coop/maps/OutageWebMap/

Lobby Closed – April 24, 2025

BARC’s lobby will be closed on Thursday, April 24 for an all-employee meeting from 8 a.m.-1 p.m.

Outage reports and payments can be made in SmartHub, portal or 1-800-846-2272.

Outage Update – April 14, 2025

Update: As of 10 p.m., due to the thunderstorms rolling through, we have over 1,500 members out across BARC’s territory.

Crews are actively working safely on these outages at this time.

We anticipate that these outages will continue throughout the evening. Please continue to utilize the links and reporting tools below.

• Call 1-800-846-2272 or download the SmartHub app to report an outage.

• Outage preparation resources: barcelectric.com/outage-preparation

• Generator safety resources: barcelectric.com/generator-safety

Outage Update – March 16, 2025

Update at 7:30 p.m.: As another storm rolls in, crews are finishing up the remaining outages from the damage caused this afternoon by several ash trees out of the maintained right-of-way. Please call 1-800-846-2272 or report on SmartHub if you are out of power.

Currently, several areas in Bath County are being affected by a transmission outage due to high winds in the area. As you can see from these photos, there are several poles with damage to restore.

Outage map: https://barcelectric.ebill.coop/maps/OutageWebMap/

Outage Update – March 5

6 p.m. update – Crews are still working on the damage from the storms today. Due to additional storms moving through the area, they have had to stand down. They are hopeful that we will be restored later this evening.

A rotten tree from outside of the well-maintained ROW took down transmission and distribution.

Luckily, no reported broken poles. However broken crossarms and damaged conductor will need to be replaced.

Photos from Jess Pritt

Maintenance Outage – February 17, 2025

For members in Rapps Mill, South Buffalo, North Buffalo, and Moore’s Creek, we have an unexpected planned outage for repairs.

This will last one hour between 4-6 p.m.

Outage Update – February 17, 2025

UPDATE As of 3 p.m., we currently have 180 members off at 31 individual locations. All crews have been assigned and are working safely yo restore

We are proud of this BARC team. They got us down to 450 members without service last night due to widespread tree damage across our region.

As of this morning, we still have 47 individual outage locations to tackle across our territory. All BARC crews will be working these outages throughout the day.

*Outage Map: https://barcelectric.ebill.coop/maps/OutageWebMap/

*Generator Safety: https://barcelectric.com/generator-safety/

*Report Outages through 1-800-846-2272, SmartHub app or portal.

Outage Update – February 16, 2025

Update: As of 10 p.m., we have 52 individual outages with almost 900 members still without power. Crews are working on restoration but with widespread damages across our territory, members should prepare to be off possibly through tomorrow.

Outage Update: At 6:30 p.m. we have close to 3,000 members out. Currently all crews are responding. Due to these widespread outages, we have no restoration times.

Due to a large transmission outage, outages that were called in prior to this may have been rolled into this group. We are asking members from Mitchelltown south to Healing Springs if you are still out, please resubmit an outage through your SmartHub app or portal or by calling 1-800-846-2272.